US "hawks" had a bizarre preference

* wolcott: "Here's what I'm wondering. Bush is making a major national address on Tuesday about Iraq. With each speech he masticated about Social Security "reform," approval for his non-existent program sagged. His sixty-day sales tour was a Willy Loman flop. Suppose he makes a rallying call on Tuesday and his poll numbers subsequently drop even more?" LINK

* wonkette picks up 'my' suggestion: "Have to give the veep this one. We looked up "throes" in the dictionary and, indeed, no time period is specified. That's why the word he should look up in the dictionary is "last." "

* "Senate Democrats are urging President Bush to consult with them on a possible Supreme Court nomination to help avoid the kind of controversy that engulfed his lower court picks." LINK
methinx we might see a helluva scotus battle.

* "DNA tests will be started to find the herd it was raised with, Mr. Johanns said. Normally, an infected animal's whole herd is slaughtered on the assumption that all ate the same feed.
He described several errors in the testing process in the United States:
¶The brain samples were frozen, which makes some tests harder.
¶Parts from five carcasses were temporarily mixed up.
¶No written records were kept." LINK

* i wonder what the june military recruiting numbers are gonna look like... i wonder if they'll change the release date again... i wonder if they'll retrospectively lower their targets again... i wonder if blinkys major speech on tuesday will call for the draft.

* "Asked whether the U.S. administration would go as far as toppling President Bashar al-Assad's government, (the anti.c.rice) said:
"Every situation is different from the other. Syria is not Iraq and Iraq is not Syria. Iraq was a special case where there was a problem of weapons of mass destruction, backing terrorism and U.N. (Security Council) resolutions. We were also in a state of war with Iraq." LINK
they cant even pretend to make sense any more.

* nyt ed: "A Pentagon inquiry's finding of no overt religious discrimination at the Air Force Academy strains credibility, considering the academy superintendent has already acknowledged it will take years to undo the damage from evangelical zealots on campus. Indeed, amid its thicket of bureaucratese, the report by an Air Force investigative panel goes on for page after page describing cases of obvious and overt religious bias. But it tosses all of these off as "perceived bias," as if the blame lies with the victims and not the offenders, and throws up a fog of implausible excuses, like "a lack of awareness" of what is impermissible behavior by military officers." LINK
who would jesus rape?

* amanda to gov.perry: ""Fuck your kids and their education, motherfucker."" LINK
the sad thing is that if perry gets beaten, it looks like ari2's mum will take the top slot.

* ""I think the drawdown will occur next year, whether the Iraqi security forces are ready or not," a senior Marine officer in Washington said last week. "Look for covering phrases like 'We need to start letting the Iraqis stand on their own feet, and that isn't going to happen until we start drawing down'. "" LINK

* "US 'in talks with Iraq with Iraq rebels'" LINK
tenbux says luntz will be able to explain why 'talks' arent 'negotiations', and why 'rebels' arent 'terrorists', because we sure as hell dont negotiate with terrorists.

* "US "hawks", he said, had a bizarre preference for Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad, a fundamentalist and hardliner, over Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, the former president who sought to establish his more pragmatic credentials in part by making overtures to the US during his election campaign." LINK
evil fucking pletka. i hope she enjoys her visit to hell. i hope she doesnt want to leave.

* in an ideal world, someone will release the iranian version of the dsm before, ya know, thousands of people are killed. is that wishful thinking? (or have hersh and ritter already done it?)

* "Tom Friedman, columnist for The New York Times, recently wrote that "liberals" no longer want to talk about the war because we were against it to start with and probably hope it ends in disaster. Good Lord, who does he think we are? Does this man actually think we are out here cheering every time another American is killed?" LINK
i hereby confirm that there are some times when i am, in fact, tempted to cheer. it fucking pains me to see anyone killed, but if theres a limit to the number of dead americans that the american people will put up with, then the sooner we get to that number, the fewer people will die. if 'the number' is 3000 dead americans, then i hope 1300 americans get blown up tomorrow, rather than over the next 2 years, if that s what it takes to save 3001 iraqi lives. or 4000. or 40,000.

* ""I would say we have been relatively successful in reducing the violence in Baghdad," Army Maj. Gen. William G. Webster, whose forces patrolled the city and environs, said before the latest spasm of attacks. "I believe that … saying anything about 'breaking the back' or 'about to reach the end of the line' or those kinds of things do not apply to the insurgency at this point.
"The insurgency is shifting all the time," he said. "This is a learning enemy."
In fact, the bombings Wednesday and Thursday, which officials say were probably coordinated, represent some of the most violent and best-planned insurgent attacks in the capital to date." LINK
cwly????????? please.

* " But if history is our guide, it will take six more years to declare peace with honor, one more time. As if most of us, Iraqis aside, did not already know that this war is over. We tried the impossible again, with the usual result -- and it will take time to craft a noble rationale for what we have done to ourselves." LINK

* "I have a lapel button with this caption: “Proud to be an American, Ashamed of my government.” I will now have to revise the first part to read “No longer proud to be an American.”" LINK